Tour Guides rehabilitate old school to lure back endemic bird species

ARUSHA: ATTRACTED by the fact that Likamba Primary School was perched in an area that is conducive to birdwatching, tour guides in the Arusha region have resorted to rehabilitating the buildings of the old institution.

Steven Ngowi, a renowned tour guide, says he was out birdwatching in the outskirts of Arusha and he discovered some two endemic bird species around the precinct.

But something else caught his attention, the area also had a school which looked so worn out and depilated as if a battle had been fought around it.

“The school suffered broken windows with dangerously jagged glass panes, see-through leaking roofs and ‘craters’ on concrete floors, with gaping cracks on the walls,” Ngowi explained.

The birdwatching excursion then turned into a school rehabilitation project.

It turned out that Likamba Primary School was overtaken by time and events, having been established over 51 years ago, back in 1974.

Ngowi contacted the teachers, who also listed more requirements for the school, including a proper fence to protect the property and the children, a kitchen, and toilet facilities.

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Glory Lyimo, the Headteacher at Likamba  School, says the school had been suffering from worn-out walls, inadequate desks, and serious cases of pupils absconding from classes due to the lack of a gated fence, which also made the school susceptible to criminals trespassing into the precinct.

But before the works, Ngowi and his associates decided to register a Non-Government Organization, which now operates as Ndifo Community Development (NDC).

At the moment, the project to rehabilitate buildings at the Likamba Primary School has been completed, with the education institution now having a new lease of life, according to the Ndifo Community Development Director, Baraka Joel.

Ndifo Community Development (NCD) rehabilitated all ten classroom buildings, repainted the school, donated 300 desks, and built a modern kitchen complete with the required utensils, to encourage children to remain in school due to the provision of midday meals.

The school did not have a kitchen, only a shack where the wind and rain came in to blow away the fire.

Ndifo Community Development Director, Baraka Joel, said they have totally overhauled the roofing, repaired the walls and floors, and at the moment started to build toilets to ensure health and sanitation among pupils and teachers.

But while the project was going on, the teachers also explained that the Likamba school badly needed a proper meal preparation facility in the form of a kitchen.

“So, the NDC designed a proper kitchen and constructed it in such a way that it would be environmentally friendly with stoves that do not require many logs of wood, just two or three pieces for cooking,” he said.

Previously, the school used plenty of firewood due to the fact that all meals were being prepared in the open air, where wind blew and the process became slow, dirty, and cumbersome, being rendered useless during rainy seasons.